


Trivia Murder Dollhouse

by Susumu



Category: Trivia Murder Party (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-06
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-17 21:40:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29232438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Susumu/pseuds/Susumu
Summary: A spin-off/semi sequel to Murder Is 24 Hours! What do the dolls do when the lights go off? Hilarity, disaster, and of course a bit of murder ensues!
Kudos: 3





	1. Let's Pretend

A man wearing a long coat opened the door to a storage closet, giving a heavy sigh as he did so. "Damn it, I did it again," he groaned, reaching into his pockets and searching for something. "Everyone dies way too quickly these days. I sent them back in time and everything. And nobody even drank any poison tonight!" As he spoke, he found what he was looking for: Hidden in his pockets were several rather ragged looking dolls. "At least I've got you guys. I can kill you as many times as I want! Though it would be more fun if you at least screamed a little, you know?" He carefully placed them into an empty box labeled 'Murder Buddies', then stood up and went out the door, still talking to himself as he went. "Is it possible to be TOO good at killing people? Nah, probably not."

Yes, as normal as everything seemed inside this closet, there was a lot going on outside. This man just happened to be the owner of the infamous murder hotel, a place where many guests had been forced to play his deadly trivia game and ended up dead. And of course, as with any place where lots of people had died, the place was also extremely haunted! All the people who died here tended to become ghosts and wander the halls of the hotel for eternity. The only real downside? Being a ghost could get terribly boring, especially when there were no guests coming by. So that's what they did- They wandered around looking for SOMETHING to do in the meantime. It was then that one of these ghosts stumbled upon this particular closet.

Obviously, the first thing they saw was boxes. So this was just another storage room. Nothing interesting here, then. That's what they thought, anyway, until the box of dolls caught their eye. Whatever these little things were, they were pretty colorful, and they were vaguely human-shaped also. That gave them an idea. Being a ghost, they were sort of lacking a physical body, but also had the ability to go through walls and other objects. The ghost focused on a purple-colored doll at the top of the pile. They focused all their energy on the doll, then jumped into it as quickly as they could. It took a minute for anything to really happen, but before long, the purple doll sat up. It looked like it worked!

As the doll began to climb out of the box, a few other ghosts had noticed what was happening, and had gathered near to watch. As the doll looked around the closet, she happened to see the other ghosts watching her. That made her wonder: Could she speak now? "Um, hi," she said. "Do I... Know any of you?" No response. "Right, right. You guys can't talk. Um, I'll tell you what. There's enough dolls in here for everyone, I think. Wanna come join me and we can see if we can't figure out who we are?"

At least one of the other ghosts seemed to like this idea. They quickly jumped into the first doll they spotted, a green one. He probably jumped in a bit TOO quickly, though. Once he was in the doll, he felt too dizzy to get up, though he tried a few times. The purple doll climbed back down to look at him. "You all right down there?" she asked.

"Ugh... That guy..." The green doll suddenly sat up as he remembered everything that had happened to him. "Hey! Uh... Whoever you are!" This was weird. He felt like he knew the purple doll, or at least recognized her voice. But then why couldn't he remember her name? "I feel like I've met you before, but I don't know."

The purple doll tilted her head. "Huh. You do seem pretty familiar to me," she answered. "Do you have a name? I think I did at some point, but I can't remember what it is."

"A name?" The green doll asked. Now that she mentioned it... "I don't think I have one either. All I remember is that I came here with a bunch of my friends, and that guy... He killed them! He killed me, and then he killed the rest of them! They couldn't see me, but I saw it all happen! Only one of them was able to escape. We tried to go with her, but we couldn't."

The purple doll thought for a minute. She vaguely remembered something like that, or so she thought. "These friends of yours... Two of them wouldn't have happened to have red hair, would they? That sounds a lot like what happened with me and my friends..."

The green doll's eyes widened. "Yeah, they did!" he replied. "How did you know? Unless... It's you, isn't it? Um... You're the one who escaped! But... I don't remember your name either. And I don't get it. You got out of here alive. What are you doing back here? And how did you... Uh, you know?"

Huh. Everything up until now had been kind of a blur. The purple doll stopped to think for a minute. "...Actually, I don't remember," she finally answered. "I'm not sure what made me want to come back here either. I think it had something to do with all of you being here. And that man who killed all of you..."

The green doll seemed to be angered by the very mention of the man. "Augh... I'm not gonna forgive that guy!" He declared. "If I ever see him again, I'll..."

"You might want to slow down on that," the purple doll said. "I don't think we can do anything about anyone with these tiny bodies. And we still haven't gathered everyone else yet, remember?"

Oh yeah. She was right. There were still a lot of other ghosts watching this unfold too. Could they have been the rest of their friends? The green doll decided to call out to them. "Um, hey, you guys! It's okay, we know each other! These dolls are safe, too! You can come talk to us. Maybe you're someone we know too!"

Another ghost hopped into another of the dolls, this time an orange one. The others watched as it layed there motionless for a second, then suddenly jumped up. "Kyah!" He shouted. He was somewhat taller than the other two, though his voice was strangely high-pitched. He then turned to the green doll. "Hey! Uh, is it really... You? I saw what that guy did to you!" He seemed angry about the whole thing. "If I was there too, we would've taken him down for sure! I SHOULD have been there! I bet he rigged that stupid pegs game or something."

The purple doll tilted her head. "I guess you can't remember your name either," she remarked. "But it looks like you really are one of our friends. I mean, you seem to know about what happened anyway." She then looked up out of the box. "Anyone else wanna come out?"

A ghost was trying their best to get into a gray doll, but they didn't seem to be having any luck. The purple doll approached them. "Just calm down," she told them. "It's easier to take over an object if you don't panic." The ghost seemed to slow down when she talked to them. They tried one more time to take over the doll. It looked like they were able to do it this time.

Sure enough, the gray doll sat up after a few seconds. He did it! He then immediately began clinging to the purple doll. "I-I've been looking all over for you!" he said. "I thought I'd never see you again... I didn't recognize you until I heard you talk!"

The purple doll patted the gray doll's head. She was relieved they at least remembered each other, but a bit sad too. It seemed none of them remembered their names, and she was willing to bet he didn't either. "It's okay," she tried to reassure him. "We're all here now. At least, I think we are. I'm not going to leave you again, I promise."

A ghost carefully settled into a yellow doll... And the first thing she did when she got up was cough. "Ah... Excuse me," she apologized. "It's been a while since I've been able to speak. Ugh, I still remember the taste of blood in my mouth..."

A pair of ghosts were looking at a pink doll. There seemed to be four ghosts left and only three dolls, but this one had two heads. Was there enough space for both of them in there? Well, they wouldn't know unless they tried, would they? The two tried going in together. After a few moments, one of the heads looked up, and then the other did. "Did... It work?" The head on the left asked.

The head on the right spoke next. "I... Think it did." He had a different sounding voice than the other head. The two tried to coordinate themselves to stand up, though they had a bit of trouble balancing at first. The right head spoke up again, this time to the left head. "Are you... Okay? As okay as you can be, I mean. Does your hand still hurt?"

"Not really," the left head answered. "I... I was scared though. All of a sudden, I can't remember my name, or yours. I was afraid I'd forget all about you..."

The right head seemed a bit sad. "I know," he responded. "At least we still have each other. I do still love you, you know. I don't know how I could ever forget you all, but especially you."

"I love you too," The left head seemed a bit relieved. "But... My brother... Ah! Where is he?" she looked around. "I didn't see him come in anywhere. Oh no, did he forget us too?"

Seeing the pink doll's distress, another ghost quickly hopped into a blue doll. They couldn't talk to her like this, and they had to say something! "Ahh!" He stood up as quickly as he was able to. "...Um, hey! You said you were looking for your brother? Did he have red hair?"

The left head of the pink doll nodded. "Yes, he did," she answered. "But how did you know? Unless..." Her eyes widened. "It's you, isn't it?"

"Yeah, I think it is!" The blue doll answered. "But... That's all I remember. My memory's been getting pretty fuzzy since I died. I guess that's what happens when you get a sword through your head."

The purple doll shook her head. "It's not just you," she said. "We've all lost our memories. A little bit of them, anyway. That's kinda the problem with being a ghost. But thankfully, being in these physical bodies should keep us from forgetting any more."

A ghost who was hesitating before was hovering over the last doll, a red one. They were very afraid of losing their memories, but... They felt like they'd hurt the yellow doll in the past. Would she be mad at them? It was better to face her than forget everything, wasn't it? They carefully settled into the red doll and brought it to life. "Am I... The last one?" she asked.

"It looks like it," the purple doll answered. "Sorry about leaving you with... Uh, that." Her face scrunched up. "Guess we can call you a literal Red Herring now?"

The red doll blinked. "Is that my name?" she asked.

Alright, so the purple doll's attempt to lighten the mood was lost on everyone. "Ah, never mind."

The red doll turned to the yellow doll and spoke. "I know who you are. And, I'm sorry. You died when I should've been the one to. It was all my fault you were killed."

"What are you talking about?" the yellow doll asked. "None of this was your fault at all! I... Did something stupid. I did it to save you. I couldn't stand to see that man kill another of you."

The orange doll started to get angry too. "It's all that guy's fault!" he declared. "We've gotta do something about it!"

"What are we going to do though?" the pink doll's left head asked. "It's not like we're big or strong enough to fight back."

"I think it would be best if we sorted things out with ourselves first," the right head added. "We don't even remember our names."

"We should probably at least come up with something to call each other," the red doll spoke again. "I kind of liked Red Herring."

The orange doll jumped in. "Yeah, I want a name too!"

Well, looked like the purple doll was coming up with names for them all. Not that she minded, she just had no idea the red doll would actually like this. "Alright. Guess Red Herring is staying." She then turned to the orange doll. "Um, for you... What about 'Alpha'? I mean, that just seems to fit you, considering how much bigger you are than the rest of us..." The orange doll seemed happy with this, as the purple doll turned to the pink doll. "As for you two, you're... An adorable pair of Lovers. One on the left and one on the right."

"How about me?" The green doll asked.

The purple doll stopped to think for a bit. "I'm gonna call you Sheriff," she finally answered. "You really want to catch that guy who killed us, huh?" She looked at the yellow doll. "And you I'll call Screamer. Because... Well, just look at you."

"I don't know how to take that," Screamer answered, though she didn't seem upset.

"Now me!" the gray doll raised his hand.

The purple doll smiled at him. "Alright, you big nerd." She stopped to think for a second.

Before she could answer though, the gray doll nodded. "Um, okay. I guess I'm Nerd then!" The purple doll was about to say something, but he seemed happy about this. She didn't have the heart to tell him.

The blue doll was the last to speak. "What would you call me?" he asked.

The purple doll tilted her head. "That's a tough one. But you look like you have three eyes now. Maybe you can see stuff the rest of us can't."

The blue doll seemed interested in that. "Like what?"

"I was joking," the purple doll answered. "But, okay. If you like that idea, let's call you Believer."

"What about you though?" Left asked. "What should we call you?"

The purple doll thought about it for several seconds, taking a look at what her body was now shaped like. "Alright. You guys can call me... Jester."

"I guess that settles that, then," Nerd remarked. "Good to meet you guys!"

"Is it really a meeting if we all already knew each other?" Red Herring asked. "I guess technically it would be, but..."

Sheriff then looked up at the edge of the box. "Well, that's one thing taken care of. Now how are we going to get out of here?"

"Leave this to me!" Alpha stepped forward. "I'm a lot bigger than I used to be. Maybe that means I'm stronger too!" He then started pushing against the side of the box. Nothing much happened for several seconds. He then turned to the rest of the group. "Hey, uh, I think I could use some help over here..." Before long, all of the others had joined him in pushing the box over. After a bit more of this, the box tilted and fell over, sending everyone falling forward.

"Wow. It actually worked," Believer said.

Jester looked around. Well, they might have been out of the box, but they were still in that closet. She then went over to the door and started pushing on it. "Hey, maybe it'll work for the door too," she said, seeing how the others were staring at her. "You guys coming or what?"

Well, no one else had any better ideas. So the rest of the group decided to join her. This was going to take a while...


	2. Tag, You're It

"Come on, there's got to be something in here!"

Alright, so even together the group hadn't been able to open the door. Now, Alpha and Sheriff were searching through some of the other boxes, looking for something they could use to open it. Alpha stuck his head out of the top of the box. "I couldn't find anything in this one either."

Sheriff looked around to see if there was another box he hadn't checked yet. It looked like they'd opened most of the boxes, except for one at the very back of the closet. "There's only one box left," he called down to his friend. "This one's gotta have something in there, I just know it!"

Alpha climbed up out of the box and followed Sheriff over to the one that was still closed. He excitedly jumped up and pulled the top open. "Do you see anything?" he asked.

Still standing on top of the boxes, Sheriff hopped his way over to the box Alpha was holding open and looked inside. Well, the first thing that caught his eye was a rather large knife, still caked with SOMEONE'S blood. Ugh. For some reason, he felt weirdly uneasy looking at it. There was also a dusty old hat in there, and what looked like a woman's wig... "Uh... What IS all this stuff?"

His reaction sparked Alpha's curiosity. The orange doll quickly pulled himself up to the top of the box to take a look inside. "Hey, cool!" he declared. "Who do you think all this stuff belongs to?"

"Probably other people that guy killed," Sheriff sighed, shaking his head. He didn't think bringing up the knife would be a good idea. "They can't exactly come claim their luggage if they're dead."

Part of Alpha felt a bit bad about this, but part of him was still curious. "If they're dead, that means nobody owns this stuff anymore, right?" he asked, still looking at the things in the box. "That means it's okay if we use them, doesn't it?" He picked up the hat and tried to put it on. It was massive compared to the rest of his body. "Well? Does it suit me?"

While he was doing whatever that was, Jester had finished searching another of the boxes, and caught sight of the two dolls climbing down from the box- And Alpha still trying to wear the enormous hat. "And what did you two find?" she asked.

"There's a bunch of cool stuff in this box!" Alpha answered. "We think it belonged to some people who came here before us, but they're all dead now, so... I guess we can borrow it."

Jester decided to climb up and take a look in the box herself. The first thing she pulled out was the knife. Huh. She got chills looking at the thing for some reason. Probably because there was still dried blood all over it. Also, it was really heavy. Probably because she was so small now.

Meanwhile, the two Lovers had somewhat figured out how to move around, and were looking through one of the other boxes. Left lifted her head to look around a bit, and she saw the others beginning to crowd around one of the boxes in the back. "Right, look!" She nudged her partner and motioned for him to look at what she was seeing. "It looks like someone found something in one of those boxes. Should we go have a look?"

Right nodded. "It could be something important. Let's go."

The two hovered over to where Alpha, Jester, and Sheriff were standing. Left couldn't help but smile at how silly Alpha looked in that oversized hat- And then her smile vanished when she saw what Jester was holding. She somehow recognized that knife, but why did she have the feeling that was HER blood? She instinctively held her hand closer to her body. She knew she'd HAVE to talk to them, but the growing feeling of dread was kind of keeping her from doing that. Right, however, managed to notice how uncomfortable she looked. "Uh, what's all this?" he asked.

"We found a box full of old stuff," Sheriff answered. "You wanna take a look inside?"

As nervous as Left was feeling about all this, she was also curious about what was in the box, and lifted her head up. "It couldn't hurt to just look for a second, right?" she asked.

"I don't see why we couldn't," Right replied. The two then hopped up to look inside the box. Though she wanted to look at the items, she didn't really want to just stick her hand in. She had no idea what other sharp objects might be in there. Right, however, decided to sort through the items himself. After looking around a bit, he finally pulled something out- What looked to be a pair of glasses with scratched-up, cloudy lenses.

"Did you find anything?" Alpha called up to the two.

Right looked down at the others. "Just these weird glasses," he answered. "I don't think I can pull them up myself though."

"Let me help," Left said, reaching down to help him lift the glasses up. They managed to kinda balance them on the edge of the box, though they still felt as though they could fall at any moment. "Who do you think these belonged to?"

"Hey, maybe they're yours!" Alpha remarked. Left had worn glasses when she was alive, hadn't she?

But Right only shook his head in response. "I don't think so," he answered. "Left had pink glasses, and I don't remember them being this badly damaged." Yeah, Left had some pretty bad scratches on her glasses, but not THIS bad. Besides, that was only because she couldn't afford to replace them.

Jester looked up at the glasses the pair was holding. Huh. That was a strange coincidence. Just a few days ago she just happened to see a couple of ghosts writing to each other on an old mirror. She thought she remembered one of them talking about that man giving them an old pair of glasses that made them see some pretty horrific stuff. But was that really true? And if it was, were these even the same glasses? "Hey, guys, I'd be careful with those things if I were you," she finally said. "I think I saw some other ghosts around here talking about those glasses. Said they might be cursed or something."

"Cursed?" Left blinked, looking at the glasses as she spoke. She wasn't so sure she wanted to hold them anymore.

"Yeah," Jester nodded. "Apparently anyone who wears them sees some pretty weird stuff. Pretty horrifying stuff too. One of those ghosts got killed by some other ghosts that weren't very nice. When they were alive, I mean. At least that's what they claimed. Said those glasses were the reason."

Now that got Alpha's curiosity. "Well, there's only one way to find out if it's true!" he declared, lifting the hat off of himself. "Left, toss those things down to me! I wanna try them on!"

Left was more than willing to hand the glasses off to someone else. But how was she going to get them down there without breaking them, or hurting herself or Right? "Uh, come on, let's get down from here," she said. Right seemed to get the idea, and tried to help her climb down- Only for the two to end up tumbling backwards and sliding down the side of the box, bringing the glasses with them. Hey, at least they got down.

Alpha lifted the glasses off of the Lovers so the two could stand up. Well, not so much "stand" as "hover in place", but they picked themselves up off the ground either way. Alpha then picked up the glasses, as much as he could, and looked through one of the lenses.

"Do you see anything weird?" Jester asked him.

The orange doll stared through the lenses for several seconds, before shaking his head. "I can't see anything through these," he answered. "Maybe if I actually put them on..." He attempted to lift the glasses onto his head, but they were much heavier than he expected. After several seconds of trying to balance them, he only ended up dropping them- And cracking the lenses of the glasses. "Uh, okay. I'm sure that'll be fine." He tried a second time, this time lifting as hard as he could. The only thing he succeeded in doing was falling over backward, accompanied by the sound of glass cracking. He was able to get out from under the glasses and stand up, but the cracked lens was now shattered.

"Huh. That... Probably isn't good," Jester remarked. "If those things are really as cursed as everyone is saying... I don't think anything good could happen if they get broken."

Right had had enough of Jester's nonsense. "A-alright, let's just cut it out with the talk of curses and stuff," he said, giving Jester a bit of a sideways glare. "We don't even have any kind of proof that sort of thing exists."

Left nudged him a bit. "Uh, Right? We're ghosts. We kind of are proof that something like that could exist."

"You know what I mean," Right sighed.

Jester shook her head. "He's probably right," she said. "They could have just been spreading a rumor. Well, either way, I hope none of us start seeing anything weird."

Left then spoke up. "I-I think I feel a little bit dizzy..."

Right took his other half's hand. "It's probably because of that fall we just took," he remarked. "Maybe we should all take a break. We can work on getting out of this closet later. At least it's safe in here."

"That's probably a good idea," Sheriff answered. "We've all been through a lot this past... Um, however long it's been. Maybe resting a bit couldn't hurt."

So the group broke apart for the time being. Alpha picked up the hat and took it with him before sitting down inside a box somewhere. The two Lovers decided to sit leaning against the box they had found the glasses in. "Don't worry about it too much, Left," Right tried to assure his other half. "I'm sure all that curse stuff was just a rumor. There's no way a normal pair of glasses could be cursed. Let's just rest for a bit, okay?"

Left nodded. "I hope you're right," she answered. She leaned her head against the box and looked around a bit. Looking at all the stacked up boxes was weirdly relaxing. She felt like she could be safe here, and that man wouldn't find her or her friends. She looked up at the lightbulb in the room and... Something seemed a bit off about it. It was pretty dark in here, and the light wasn't even on. So what was with those weird colorful lights she was seeing? Actually, EVERYTHING she looked at was giving off that weird glow, even her own tiny hand. She was about to say something to write, until they heard someone scream.

Sheriff was the first one to be alerted, of course. "Was that Red Herring?! Where did that come from?!"

"We'd better go see what's up with her," Right said. "Uh, Left, you don't mind, do you?"

Left shook her head, trying to ignore the weird lights she was seeing. "What if that man is back?" she asked. "We've got to go help her if that's the case."

Sure enough, all the rest of the dolls were headed to see what was going on with Red Herring. She was laying next to one of the boxes, curled up and hiding her face in her tail. "Hey, are you alright?" Sheriff called out to her. "What happened?"

Red Herring looked up at the green doll, using her tail to motion to one of the boxes. "I-In there!" She answered. "There's blood coming out of that box! I saw it! It's all over the floor now!"

But Sheriff... Wasn't seeing any blood anywhere at all. What was she talking about? Believer carefully approached her. "Hey, it's alright," he tried to calm her down. "There's just some stains on that box, but I don't see any blood coming from it. It was probably just because it's so dark in here you thought you were seeing things."

The red doll looked up at him, her eyes widening. "Y-You're bleeding too!" She declared, looking at the rest of the dolls. "All of you... Your heads are bleeding!"

Everyone looked at each other, but... They didn't see anything. All of them looked fine to each other. Left didn't notice anything unusal about the others, but she suddenly began to feel something running down her face. "...Right?" She rubbed her hand across her face and inspected it, nearly screaming at what she saw. Oh god, Red Herring was right! Her hand... Her HEAD was covered in blood! "I'm...!"

This got Right's attention. "Hey, hey!" He put his hand on Left, where her shoulder would have been. "You're alright, okay? You're not bleeding. We don't even have blood."

Left looked back at her hand again. Wait, what? There was blood all over her just a second ago. And now... It was gone. "Huh? But... I was just..."

"But if it wasn't ours, then whose was it?" Red Herring asked.

Right sighed. "There is no blood," he answered. "That box is empty." He couldn't say that for sure, but if it'd calm the girls down, it'd help a lot.

"It's gotta be that curse thing Jester was talking about!" Alpha spoke up, holding the hat up in front of him. "It's making us see stuff that isn't there!"

Right glared at him. "Would you guys stop it with the curse stuff?" he snapped. "It's freaking everyone out!"

"Excuse me, but... What's all this about a curse?" Screamer asked.

Great. The last thing Right needed was for the others to get dragged into this. "It's nothing, Screamer," he replied. "Just Jester making up some ridiculous story. Curses aren't real, and that's that. I think being trapped in this closet is making us all crazy. Let's just focus on getting out of here."

So the group went to look around the closet a bit more. Believer, however, was looking at the door. More specifically, at the crack at the bottom of the door. They were all pretty small now, weren't they? Maybe he could try something. He got down on the floor and began to attempt crawling under the door. No one noticed him doing this at first, until Right looked over and saw him. "What... Are you doing?" he asked.

Believer tried to look up at him, though that was difficult since his head was halfway under the door. "We're a lot smaller than we used to be, right?" he asked. "Maybe we're small enough to fit under the door now! If I can just get my head through here..." Having a big button eye right in the middle of his head certainly didn't help things. He managed to get his head through, but... The rest of his body was a bit wider than his head. He got about halfway through before he realized what had happened. "Eh... I-I think I'm stuck!" He tried to pull himself out, but his new arms and legs were too stubby to give him much traction.

As soon as Believer called out that he had gotten himself stuck, the two Lovers immediately rushed over to help him. "Alright, let's just coordinate ourselves here," Right said, mostly to keep both Left and Believer calm. They put their hands on Believer's legs and tried to pull him out.

"Wait, should we be pushing or pulling?" Left asked.

Right looked down at Believer. "Which way do you want to go?" he asked.

Believer stayed quiet for a second. "Well, I'd really like to see what's on the other side of this door..."

As he was talking, though, Left started to feel weird again. Why was she suddenly feeling so itchy? While Right was trying to push Believer through the door, she started rubbing her face. It was difficult with her tiny stubby hand, but it sort of made her feel better. ...No, no, it was just getting worse. Without even thinking about it, she leaned down to start rubbing her face on the door. Right suddenly found himself dragged forward- And Believer was pushed through to the other side. He was out! "Hey, that worked!" he called out to the Lovers. "How did you do that?"

He didn't get an answer back, though. Instead, all he heard was a panicked shout from Left. Right tried to get up, but it wasn't really happening when his other half was panicking like this. "Left, Left!" He put his hand on her, trying to calm her down. "What's wrong? Are you alright?"

Suddenly, rubbing her face on the door wasn't feeling so good anymore. Actually, it was starting to get kind of painful. Left pulled her face away from the door. 'Uh- Didn't you just feel really itchy right now?" she asked.

Right seemed concerned. "No, I... Didn't," he answered. "Are you feeling okay? You've been acting like there's-"

And that was when they heard more screaming. It wasn't Red Herring this time, though. "What are you doing?! Stop fighting!" Screamer's voice could be heard even through all the boxes.

"What's going on?" Believer called out from behind the door. 

"Nothing, Believer!" Right suddenly called out in a panic. "We're taking care of things in here!" He then lowered his voice to talk to Left. "We'd better go see what's happening."

The two made their way over to the rest of the group. They all seemed to be backing away from one doll in particular- It was Sheriff. He seemed to be worked up about something, but no one could tell what exactly. Screamer seemed to be trying to comfort him, but it wasn't working. He turned around to face her. "Who are you?!" he yelled. "Screamer, get back! I can deal with this!" He leaped past her, only to end up landing on the ground.

The Lovers quickly caught up with Jester. Left was starting to feel itchy again, so Right was the one to talk to her. "Jester, I'm starting to think maybe you were right," he began. "I think this curse thing is real after all. Sheriff's not the only one acting weird. Left and Red Herring were seeing blood everywhere earlier, and well..." He then motioned to Left, who was rubbing herself against the edge of a box.

Jester nodded. "I thought so," she answered. "Screamer and I have been trying to hold down Sheriff here. Nerd's been trying to find a way to calm him down, but... I don't know how much luck he's had."

"I hope he finds something soon," Right sighed, trying to keep Left calm. "Or Left might tear our body apart."

Meanwhile, Alpha was helping Nerd push a book out of a box. "I've gotta say," he said, in between stopping for breath. "...I think I'm getting used to this body! I already do feel a lot stronger now!" He pushed the book over to its front cover so the two could read it. "So, uh, how's this book gonna help us anyway? ...'A Comp- Competit- Compila..."

"It says 'Compendium', Alpha," Nerd explained. "'A Compendium Of Supernatural Ailments'. With this, we should be able to find out what's wrong with everyone." He pushed the cover open and began to flip through the pages. "No, no one is bleeding... No one got possessed... Huh. What's this say? ...'If you have recently angered an evil spirit, you may be noticing horrific things that no one else seems to be able to see. Blood dripping from the walls, strange lights or shadows, and even physical feelings that aren't actually happening. This 'supernatural madness' is known to spread between people, if the spirits feel so inclined to do so.'"

"That sounds like what's going on with the others!" Alpha remarked. "But how do we stop it? You saw Sheriff back there. There's no way we can fight those things!"

Nerd continued reading. "We don't have to fight them," he answered. "Let me see what it says here. ...'In many cases, these evil spirits are actually humans who have reconnected with the physical world through their past belongings. This generally happens due to their belongings being tampered with. To destroy the spirits, all you need to do is destroy their belongings.'"

Alpha glanced back to the hat that he'd been carrying around. Maybe he should put that back where he found it. "Uh, maybe I should stop messing with this thing," he said. He scooped up the hat and brought it back to the box he'd found it in. As he tossed the hat back into the box, though, he caught sight of the glasses on the floor. Suddenly, he started to feel... Weirdly angry looking at them. He remembered what Jester said about them being potentially cursed and picked them up. "This is all because of you, isn't it?!" Without even thinking about it, he suddenly just... Snapped the glasses in half.

Suddenly, Left realized what she was doing. "Ow. Ow, ow ow ow." She pulled her face away from the box. "...Right? What's happening? I was suddenly really itchy... But now I'm not?"

Right turned to face her. "Hey, Left! You feeling okay now?" he asked. "It looks like Nerd found a solution after all. That's good. I thought you were going to scratch yourself to pieces or something."

Jester nodded. "So that curse stuff was real after all," she remarked. "I just hope Sheriff and Red Herring are doing better too."

Sheriff stood up and looked around. "...Huh? Screamer? What's going on? What WAS that thing?"

Screamer let out a sigh of relief. She didn't really have the heart to tell him about all the curse stuff. "Oh, it must have been a ghost or something," she said, faking a smile. "Probably just messing with you or something."

Alpha and Nerd made their way over to the others. "Hey, guys, we got rid of those ghosts!" Alpha called out. "They shouldn't be bothering us anymore."

Left tilted her head around a bit. "I don't think we should be messing around in this closet anymore," she said. "Not if things like this are going to keep happening."

"I think that's for the best," Screamer replied. "Really, I just want to find a way out of here."

A way out of- "Ah, damn it!" Right suddenly yelled, dragging Left over to the door with him. "We forgot about Believer!"

The other dolls looked over and followed him. "Right, what's wrong?" Screamer asked. "Did something happen to Believer?"

"Uh, no," Right answered. "But he found a way out of here. Watch this." He motioned for Left to follow him, and the two got down on the floor to climb under the door like Believer had. It was much easier for them to do so, for some reason.

Sheriff was the first to get the idea. He climbed under the door after them, though he had a bit of trouble getting his head through. Red Herring was next to follow. "Um, I think I might need some help?" she asked. She didn't exactly have arms to push herself through the door. Alpha helped her get through before climbing through himself. Before long, all eight of the dolls had made it through to other other side.

"Uh, wow," Jester remarked. "That was a lot easier than I thought it'd be."

"So what are we supposed to do now?" Left asked. "We can't leave our bodies or we'll lose our memories again, and I think that man would notice if we just walked away with these dolls..."

Alpha looked down the hallway. "Hey, now that we're out of there, we've got this whole murder hotel in front of us!" he said. 

"Excuse me, fun?" Right asked. "Did you forget that we've all just been murdered very recently? I think my body is still in that elevator. How is any of this going to be fun?"

"We're all still together," Alpha replied. "Who's to say we can't make our own fun?" He went over to another door and started climbing under. "Maybe we'll find something cool in this room!"

Screamer followed him "Alpha, wait! Don't just go off on your own!"

Right shook his head. Nothing got Alpha down at all, did it? Well, he was right. At least they hadn't forgetten each other. Even so, he saw everyone else following Alpha into the door. He couldn't just leave them behind like that, could he?

"Well, here we go again, I guess..."


End file.
